My great-grandmother Hazel Shope was known as many things - wife, mother, grandmother, spit-fire, cat-lover, and quilter to name a few. For a time, my Pap Shope, Hazel's son, worked at a textile factory, and he would bring home wool and faux fur fabric scraps from the linings of coats, which she would repurpose into squares for yet another patchwork quilt. She'd sit beneath a lamp in the kitchen, hand-knitting squares together in long rows. The backing - usually a heavy wool - was later attached with knotted yarn, and the border was sewn down with a characteristic zigzag stitch on her old foot-peddle Singer sewing machine. In her later years she left a few unintended surprises in her quilts - pins accidentally left in by failing eyes and found later by relatives' legs. Any guests who would stop by her house to visit her were likely to be asked to thread a few needles for her before they left, since her eyesight no longer allowed her the ability. Her best work was always done by hand, and when she had her mind set on finishing something, she did it.
Today, many of my family members still own one of her famously-thermal keepsake quilts, and her memory and love lives on in our homes, ready to be passed on to the next generation. I've been told I'm like her - crafty, resourceful, caring, and sharp. Sewing is just one more way I'm able to reconnect with a woman I don't remember well, but will hear stories about for a lifetime. I've updated my technology since her hayday, but the heart behind each sewn piece remains the same as when my great-grandmother hand-stitched squares in her home decades ago. From our family to yours, welcome to The Hazel Shope.
Fun fact! Our family name is pronounced with a long "o" and a silent "e" - like "hope" with a "sh" sound in front. We've gotten all sorts of wacky pronunciations of Shope over the years: Sheep, Swope, Shoop, and of course Shop or Shoppe, depending on how fancy you want to be with your spelling. The name of this sewing business, therefore, is both a tribute to THE Hazel Shope and also a play on a common mispronunciation of our last name. However you say it, we're glad you're here!